The Heap

On Sunday morning, we got up early and headed out of town to Lolo pass near the Idaho border.  The climbing guidebook suggested that there were a few good sport routes in this area, we were going for a place called the Heap. 

We drove through some scenic country - rolling hills forested with pine and most of the way the road was accompanied by a river.  As we got closer, we saw more and more granite outcroppings.  That is what we were looking for. 

We ended up at the turnout indicated by the guide book.  The road we needed was closed by the National Forest service, so we needed to park the van at the bottom of the hill.  It was scorching hot outside.  I downed a cold can of soda in seconds.  Since we weren't sure exactly where this wall was, or how far it was, we decided to get out the mountain bikes and scope out the area.  

It was pretty fun biking on the forest road, it was nice and shady.  We ditched the bikes a few times to hike up some promising looking trails.  Eventually, after meandering around the woods for a while, we spot a promising looking outcropping.  Joey sees a giant vulture perched on the top - so we decide to get a closer look.  We scramble uphill through some thick grass and slide around a bit in some loose sandy dirt and finally make it to the rock.  The glitter of steel on the rock rewards us - we had found the Heap! 

Downriver

The next morning in Missoula got off to a late start.  We were staying with some friends of Graham, one of our friends in LA who grew up in Montana.  Joey had wanted to go mountain biking with Noah, one of the guys we were staying with, but neither of them were really up to it in the morning. 

Instead we went to the local farmer's market in town.  I bought some cantelope - which were apparently pretty famous judging by the reaction we got when bringing them back to the house.  It was a pretty neat experience browsing a farmers market where everyone seemed to know each other.  Missoula is a pretty large town by Montana standards, but everyone still seems to know everyone else. 

We also saw some pretty rad street music at the farmer's market.  (sorry about the siren noise)

Kootenai Canyon

After camping nearby, we headed for a fun day of climbing at Kootenai Canyon.  We spent some time consulting the guidebook on some climbs in our grade, and had trouble finding too many sport routes in the canyon.  We found three sport routes that we could climb - two 5.9s and one 5.10a. 

In the parking lot, after making some sandwiches, we noticed the trees flurrying.  Let me explain, there where white dots floating around all of the pine trees in the parking lot.  I had a hard time taking a photo of the phenomena.  Then I noticed white "flurry" by the van.  I wasn't sure if it was a moth or a butterfly, and spent a good while chasing a few of them to find out.

Whitefish and Kalispell

Adrianne:

The next day, I still wanted to take it easy on my ankle so we decided to try and find some more no-ankle activities like canoeing. After some internet searching, we found some cheaper boat rentals than were offered in the national park at Whitefish lake a few miles south. The boat rental place was at a swanky resort – so we dressed up in our finest boating gear (ha!) and headed down to the dock.

They did have canoes and kayaks for rent at reasonable prices, but we also noticed they rented stand-up paddleboards. I thought it was unlikely that Joey would want to try one since he always gives SUPers a hard time – SUPers and surfers are constantly at odds with each other. I cajoled him anyways – and the guys working the boat house also said the SUPs were 'totally' cooler than kayaks. The SUPs were twice as expensive as the canoes – but since it was a new experience we were game to spend the extra cash.

Glacier NP

We crossed into the US without issue. No serious searching or otherwise odd procedures. Rolling in a fairly conspicuous vehicle, I was a little concerned we might get some special treatment. Canada was great, but crossing back into the US gave us that “back home” feeling that's hard to get in other countries.

Belly River

After a short backtrack to score some more showers at the Nordic Center, we headed south through Alberta toward Waterton National Park.  It was beautiful country: the mountains turned into foothills and rolling plains.  

Cougar Canyon

After biking at the Nordic Center, we wanted to explore one of the roads pointed out to us by the climbers we had met at Grassi Lakes.  He suggested we'd be able to camp along the road, as we were used to dispersed camping style. 

We headed up the road, but mile after mile were tightly controlled provincial park areas.  We saw one campground near a lake, but it was full.  We were examining our maps and the GPS to try and find a place that we could camp.  After driving for about 2 hours, we decided to take the next highway back towards Canmore.  

It was getting towards evening, and the sky was turning pink and yellow.  As we pulled onto the small highway back towards Canmore we ran into a herd of Rocky Mountain sheep!  It was a herd of females, and a bunch of babies - they were hilarious to watch jump over the guardrails. 

Canmore

When we climbed at Lake Louise some other climbers mentioned some good climbing areas in Canmore, about 15 minutes outside of Banff. After camping in Banff for the evening, we headed to Canmore the next day to find some more great climbing. We stopped at a climbing store and picked up a guidebook and went to a biking store to pick up an extra tube, and absorbing some great info at both places.

We selected Grassi Lakes for our climbing destination for the afternoon. As we pulled into the parking lot, a group of bighorn sheep greeted us (in Canada they call them Rocky Mountain Sheep).

Lake Louise Take Two

As my family headed back to Colorado, Adrianne and I decided to stay in the Banff area a few more days. We returned to Lake Louise after hearing that there was a great selection of sport climbing right off of the lake.

Getting to Lake Louise, we encountered some chipper Canadian park rangers. Their accents were especially thick and hilarious.

The approach was a an easy jaunt around the picturesque lake, and some of the climbing was belayable from the main flat trail. Without a guidebook for the area, we walked around and checked out a few of the bolted lines from the ground. A doable-looking climb on some slabby rock stood out as our first target. Gung-ho, I started up the route, only to be slow past some sections that weren't as easy as they looked from the ground. Adrianne struggled a bit but made it up the route as well. Climbers on routes to either side of us kept us company at this popular climbing spot. During small talk with one of our climbing neighbors, they pointed out a few nearby routes, including a nice two-pitch 10c. I responded: “Thanks, but that's a little out of our grade”. The climbers gave me a confused look in return, but didn't think anything of it at the time.

 The first climb of the day named The Incredible Talking Woman

 Adrianne resting at the crux

Guest Post

Hi Readers! This is Christine, Joey’s favorite and coolest sister guest writing for a post! This is my first blog experience so hang in there.  

The morning dawned cloudy, drizzly and chilly and all 7 of us piled into the trusty Suburban to head up the Ice Roads Parkway. The drive up was mostly uneventful; Joey, Adrianne, Elizabeth, and Margaret all fell asleep while I took in the beautiful mountain landscape whipping past the windows. 

Sleeping through the scenery.

Banff and Family

Leaving Revelstoke, we had a bit of ground to cover to make it to Banff to meet up with my family.  We stopped in Glacier National Park (Canada) for a quick hike on the way, then drove through Yoho and Banff national parks to get to the city of Banff where my family was hanging out.  Along the Canada 1 through the parks, large fences keep wildlife away from the freeway.  Bridges with trees and grasses planted on top and tunnels allow wildlife to safely cross the traffic.

We rolled in after dinner to meet the my family.  My parents had some warm leftovers and mountains of cookies waiting for us.  My whole family had made it up to Canada for the first summer that we all vacationed together in quite a few years.  My sisters and parents had already had a couple days of adventures hiking around Moraine Lake and some waterfalls in the park.

My fam having fun at Moraine Lake.  

Revelstoke starts in reverse

"OMGBLAHPFFTTGAHWHAT!"

I wake with a start.  In my delirium, I imagine the van rolling off the cliff, bears ripping the van open, and other apocalyptic nightmares. 

"What is it!? Are there bears!?" I ask. 

"Shhhhhhhhh!" Joey leans over and puts his hand over my mouth. "Look at that" he whispers.  He points towards the windshield and a bull elk is staring straight at us in the van.  The elk is at eye level and not even a few feet away from the front of the van. 

I am frozen.  Eventually the elk turns his huge antlered head and looks towards the other side of the road.  Another bull Elk looks back at him.  The two bulls continue grazing on the side of the road/mountain.  The slowly ramble downhill. 

I collapse back onto the bed.  It is not even 6 in the morning.  

Joey is primed and ready for action. He jumps out of bed, and eats some breakfast (leftover stew from the night before... surprisingly delicious first thing in the  morning).  He gets dressed and is ready to go.   My head feels like it is stuffed with cotton.   I am cold, and not ready to move anywhere quickly.  

Joey runs around the van and moves the chocks out of the way of the tires, and starts inspecting the route recommended by the GPS.  Slowly I make my way to the front seat. 

"Look, we can just continue up this road for three miles and make it back to Highway 1."  Joey tries to convince me that getting an early start today is great idea.  Then we'd have plenty of time to visit Revelstoke and Glacier National Parks today before heading to Banff to meet up with his family. 

We fire up the van and continue uphill along the road. 

Check out the topo view of this map I made of our trip:  

Map of our off road journey up Mt. English

We are practically on top of Mt. English - we didn't know that at the time.  We could see the mountain top and it seemed pretty close - it was actually rather fantastic.  The clear morning air made everything seem a lot better. 

We rumble up the road, and criss-cross the utility lines again.  We stop to shower and feel refreshed.  Okay - awake and ready for action!

We rumble across a flat section of terrain, the brush begins to get thicker and thicker.  We were used to some dense vegetation crowding the road before - but this was like we were driving over a single-track bike path!

Eventually we clear the brush, and start going over some boulder-y terrain.  The rocks are a mix - between football size and smaller gravel.  We reach an uphill section and the wheels start spinning. 

No problem. 

Joey jumps out and locks up the front wheels and we kick the van into FOUR WHEEL DRIVE.  

Woo-hoo!  Things are looking good. 

Kamloops

Some days on the van trip we try to be pretty boring.  We headed out from our sweet campsite outside of Whistler and Banff national park. That day we needed to cover a lot of ground and to take care of a few chores. 

We rolled down from the Cascade mountains and into the dry plains of Canada along highway 1.  It was a high desert terrain and hot. A big change from the misty cool weather we'd had in the Olympic peninsula and Vancouver for the past week. 

Sam and Adam

In the morning we headed off to Canada. We passed some auto parts stores, and jumped at the chance to change our battery cables. The van was getting a little hard to start when hot, and then the cables were worn. One of the terminals had even started to melt from a bad contact, so we couldn't wait longer. All of the cables off was a little trickier than we thought (as usual when fixing the van), but eventually we were back on the road.

Melting battery connection and bad wire.

Wonderland

Leaving Vancouver, we headed north to Squamish along the Sea to Sky parkway. Unfortunately, low clouds and rain obstructed the views on this scenic route. In Squamish, we stopped at the nicest visitor center along the trip, complete with an espresso bar and free wifi. We had planned out a few climbs, but the rainy weather ruined our plans. Instead, we went for a soggy mountain bike ride.

Great climbing rained out.

Awesome visitor center.

Orcas and Eagles

There are very few things on our trip that we decided to do for sure from the outset.  One of them was to go see Orca whales in Washington.  My Aunt Kathy recommended an outfit that went out of the islands off of the coast of Washington where you could spot Orca whales.  I wanted to see them. 

In the evening after hiking the Deer Lake trail, we stopped at a sweet coffee shop in Port Angeles.  Our mission was to find a spot on one of the Orca whale tours for tomorrow.  After looking at various tour websites, Joey decides that the tour boats would be 'too lame' for him.  He starts looking at little inflatable zodiac tour boats.  I think those are insane. 

Eventually I come across an Orca kayaking tour.  This would be cool - even if we didn't see Orcas, we'd be kayaking in the ocean - and if we did see Orcas, it would be nuts because we'd be in kayaks. 

At this point it's about 9pm, and I'm not so sure if this place even had spots open for us to join their tour.  I call them up and the owner of the company answers the phone.  He was a super nice guy, we explain we'd like to join in on a tour for tomorrow, and he tells us that the group he has booked has 9 participants - if he took on two more he'd need another guide.  He tells us he'll call up another guide and see if they'd like the work and he'd call us back to let us know. 

Not even 15 minutes later, the guy calls us back and says another guide would be happy to work tomorrow - so we were free to join in on the tour.  We enthusiastically agree to join the tour.  Then I ask him if it is even resonable for us to get to the tour by 10:30 am the next morning.  The thing was, we were in Port Angeles, and the tour started from Friday Harbor.  

The geography off of the Olympic peninsula is something like this:  The peninsula is pretty large, and north of Seattle.  To get to Seattle you can drive around the edge of the peninsula - but you have to backtrack south a bit and you are in for a 3 hour ride.  North of the peninsula are a series of islands.  To reach them you need to take a ferry.  We were sort of in the middle of the peninsula, and needed to reach one of the northern-most islands. 

Clark, the tour owner was awesome.  He came up with a perfect itinerary for us to reach the tour in time.  We would need to take the 6:30am ferry from Port Townsend (about 2 hours from Port Angeles).  Then we'd need to drive the length of the Whidbey island (about an hour), to reach our next ferry by 9am.  That ferry we could just "walk-on" and ride for an hour to reach Port Friday. We'd likely arrive about 30 minutes before the tour and it allowed some time for the ferry to be late.  He even recommended a place to camp after the tour.

So that's what we did.